Lot 3667. A rare doucai 'Five Bats' saucer dish, Mark and period of Yongzheng  (1723-1735; 15.3 cm., 6 in.. Estimate 800,000 — 1,200,000 HKD. Lot sold 1,000,000 HKD (118,859 EUR). © Sotheby's

the shallow rounded sides rising from a tapered foot, decorated in the centre with five iron-red bats soaring around a gnarled peach tree, issuing from the side of a cliff above a green sea with crested waves breaking over jagged rocks, the exterior with four fruiting sprigs each enclosing a stylised shou character within a flowerhead, alternating with pairs of confronting iron-red bats, inscribed to the base in underglaze blue with a six-character reign mark in two columns within a double-circle

Provenance: Hugh Moss Ltd., London, 1972.
Christie's New York, 15th September 2011, lot 1548.

Note: Compare a pair of Yongzheng saucer dishes of the same design from the E.T. Chow Collection, sold in our rooms, 19th May 1981, lot 557, and a single example sold in these rooms, 4th April 2012, lot 3181. Compare also the doucai dish in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, illustrated in Rose Kerr, Porcelain of the Qing Dynasty 1644-1911, London, 1986, no. 86. Another is illustrated in Theresa Tse Bartholomew, Hidden Meanings in Chinese Art, Hong Kong, 2006, p. 221, no. 7.55.1 where the author explains that the iconography refers to the double birthday greetings "May your blessing be as deep as the Eastern Sea, and may you live as old as the Southern Mountain".

Sotheby's. Important Chinese Works of Art, Hong Kong, 07 april 2015